


And Birdie Makes Three

by Berd_Alert (Cassa_of_the_fans), Nobodyhasblindedme



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Adoption, Alternate Universe - Fantasy, Alternate Universe - Modern with Magic, M/M, Mystical Creatures, Other, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Parenthood, Were-Creatures, Werewolf Jake English, dullahan dirk
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-03-05
Updated: 2020-03-05
Packaged: 2021-03-01 03:02:02
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,866
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23018239
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Cassa_of_the_fans/pseuds/Berd_Alert, https://archiveofourown.org/users/Nobodyhasblindedme/pseuds/Nobodyhasblindedme
Summary: The world humans know and once shared with all manor of beings from this place, and Elsewhere, has changed. There are very few wild places left, and indeed, even fewer the wild ones who dwell there. They can still be found though, peering through humanity's all-encompassing hold.When Dirk and Jake come across something very much of the wild, their days of mundane pretense are ended.
Relationships: Dave Strider/Karkat Vantas, Jake English/Dirk Strider, others to be included at a later date
Comments: 2
Kudos: 21





	And Birdie Makes Three

Your name is Dirk, and it was cold, and it was raining. 

The sun had set already, leaving the world without even its wan winter rays as something of a consolation prize for its inability to grace the heavens with its presence for more than eight hours a day. Grey drizzle fell in small, cold droplets that sunk into your hoodie and shirt and soaked your canvas shoes that Jake had warned you against wearing when he rolled over and proclaimed it was a good day to stay in bed that morning. 

Your Ride was not by your side this time, leaving a cold spot in his mind, a single book taken from a full shelf with only it’s missing place to suggest it was ever there at all. 

Or a single dry spot of cloth amidst raindrops to suggest there was once sun. 

Whatever. You hugged your hoodie about yourself and walked on, hurried by the mounting weather and dying day. The streetlamp glowed the same color as your eyes in the night, and the frigid evening air masked that it wasn't steam that bellowed out in clouds of grey and inky blue. 

The seam collaring your neck was tight.

A pile of rubbish lay at the corner of the road - a house beyond it in the yard equally abandoned and left to rot away into a heap of nothing anyone ever wanted to look at, let alone do anything to finish the job half-done of clearing away. 

Tonight it seemed Fate would have something more of a say though. 

Through the gathering darkness, as you take careful steps to avoid a deep puddle growing in the blocked gutter, something 

_sc re a ms_

_Freeze_

The air around you stilled as the sound hung suspended in the night as your breath dissipated into the air. It’s tiny. It’s loud but hoarse. 

It was coming from the garbage pile. 

A tiny, grimy little...*something* dislodges itself from within the detritus, scrabbling claws and the rapid, staccato sound of something flapping and banging about. Through old springs and pizza boxes, couch cushions and rotting newspapers of a year long dead, black, oozing bags of lord-knew-what..

You don’t move for all of ten seconds - not that anyone's counting. The..thing shifts ungainly in the papers, long, thin legs like pipe cleaners and a shiny, tiny beak are all that distinguishes it from another bit of trash just fallen from the overflowing bins. 

It shivers in a cool gust of breeze, and the baby bird lets out another, pathetic little croak.

_Another bit of meaninglessness, lost to the world in a pile of the forgotten._

You don't have time to make his approach slow and deliberate to not spook. The small pot of unwanted, alien fear broils somewhere near your belly as you scoop the little bird, a tiny little chick like a ball of wet, trampled cotton into your palm. 

Your hand is little better than the rainy, cold night surrounding them, it’s body vibrating with shivers. 

The little bird shakes in your hand and curls up into a tiny puff of feathers. It makes a pathetic croaky noise, but stays put. It doesn’t have the strength to struggle anymore. 

Shit. Shit. You grab up your other sleeve, as little protection from the elements as it can offer, and cup your other hand over the tiny thing, feeling the soaked downy feathers urge him on faster into the twilight. Fuck, how you long for your Ride right now, her warm leather seat, motor breathing under your legs in a familiar rumble, black tires beating the road into *your* domain..

Luckily, home isn’t far.

The house - well, 'house', the building itself is shared with another family in a duplex, the walls thin enough to hear what one will never scrub from memory - has never looked better. For what little good it does with your skin that holds as much warmth as a candle that was never lit you hold the chick a little closer. Every step seems an eternity. Something is building, had been building in your chest and body and under your skin all day, since the first raindrop fell from the sky and the first sign of cold breeze hushed through the trees today. Thick like tar, clinging filth like motor oil in your chest..

The seam at your neck is tight. Surgeon-precision stitching, every morning you have to be out. _But it can't hold it in forever, and you're out in the street still._

You reach for his back pocket, keys held with a shaking hand but 

the lock clicks and the door swings open. 

The figure in the doorway is larger than you only by mass - you still manage to tower like a particularly gangly beanpole over just about anyone you meet, so you suppose it’s only right for your partner to take the other end of the spectrum. Arms used to lifting a body’s weight in soil and supplies frame the door, and wide green eyes catching the bright, cheery light of the kitchen just beyond blink out of a handsome face. 

Jake cocking his head as he steps out of the way so you can enter.

“Dirk! I've been keeping an ear out so you wouldn't be waiting in the rain for too long. C'mon, get in quick, you look like someone’s tossed you into the lake, dearheart," he fusses. Arms come towards you, but you duck out of their trajectory for the moment. Jake cocks his head, embrace still hanging offered in the air. 

Under your palm, the chick squirms. 

Jake’s eyes narrow as you sigh, leaning back against the door to close it all the way with a definitive _clatch_. His nose wrinkles, probably the scent of unknown garbage in his home, and you slowly 

slowly unfurl your hand. 

Jake’s going for the dish towel tucked into the oven’s handle before you can so much as open your mouth to explain yourself. The hand holding the little bird hand shakes, and Jake cups it with both his own and the towel. His hold is warm, just like the house. Warm and golden, against the plume of black still worming its way from the sides of your mouth with every breath. 

"Jake, I need - need to you just hold this, ok?" Your voice is a little shaky, a little..hollow. 

He thankfully doesn't question, taking the bird you scoot into his waiting hold. It will be better there -warmer. 

"You got it, lovely. Ought to sit down, you're starting to look a little rough."

"Yeah.." you manage to grunt out before you're making a rather tactical retreat towards the bathroom. Your head was aching, back and across your shoulders, something broiling under your skin. 

You don't bother turning on the light to the bathroom when you enter. Don't need it. The amber glow from your eyes like lamps in the night is more than enough to illuminate the room even though you wouldn't even need that much to see. You locate the kit under the sink with memory alone. Something's whispering in your ear, or screaming. You can't really tell the difference. Maybe it’s a voice. Or a hundred voices. Maybe it’s just your growing headache. 

The little pair of scissors feel like a live wire when you make the first snip.

_It's like pitch, pouring out of you then, as you lean over the bathtub, thick like mud and congealed blood, and it only comes faster and thicker as you keep cutting away the strands holding you together. You live in the city, and horrible things happen to people in cities. Souls all bunched up together like a strangled wood, packed together so tightly there is no air, they are suffocating, ants in an anthill, rabbits in a warren while the holes are being filled in. People die. And your bound to collect, whether you want to or not. The scream of a woman if fear, the cursing and rage of a man, the tears of a child alone and hungry, all a mire building like tar inside of you and just as entrapping. It bleeds out as you drop the scissors and get a firm hold, jerking and making it clean_

and you finally let the last of the shadows fall like dry ice into the tub, writhing for a moment before disappearing like the apparitions they were. You snip the last of the little strings keeping something connected that never really was, and let yourself rest for a moment. You tuck your head under your arm and enjoy the peace of finally having your body to yourself again.

It’s always worse when it rains. 

You'd normally hop into the shower after your little nightly ritual, especially after a day like today and how fuckin light you feel even compared to five minutes ago. But, there's something new in the house and having literally shaken the proverbial cobwebs from your head, you feel a little more keen to investigate it. Now that you can really concentrate on it. 

You do yourself the favor of changing out of the rain soaked work clothes at least. Hey, if Jake hasn't taken his own cleanse for the night, maybe later you can..make up your attitude to him. 

Or not. 

Walking back into the kitchen, head still casually under one arm you're greeted with the sight of Jake getting his own impromptu bath from the drenched puffball itself.While you were taking care of yourself, Jake had apparently seen fit to remove the filth coating the bird’s feathers and all the stench that came with it. Flopping about in his hands, the scent now of clean soap and warm water. Of course, the bird seemed to have perked up, flapping its tiny wings in the water when he was set down, droplets flung far and wide. 

Jake can't seem to help but laugh as water soaks into his shirt, already finding himself attached to this tiny baby bird. His head turns slightly, acknowledging your returned presence with a smile and a wave of the hand holding the hand towel for when the crow is done with his ablutions.

"I think he's feeling a little more lively now that he's warming up! And here I thought being soaked to the bone was for those of us caught in the rain,” he comments lightly, though you can see how those bottle green eyes wash over your form, hopefully finding it more relaxed. 

For your part, you step closer and set your head on the counter next to the washing bird and let your body wrap an arm around Jake, finally. He leans into the contact, humming appreciatively. It’s too good, like this, you think at times. How he just..lets you get on with it. Doesn’t nanny, doesn’t pry, but cares. Cares too fucking much for all the heart in his chest, and you shoving him aside - you don’t mean to be so dismissive,you swear-

Jake sighs. “Whatever’s going on in that head of yours,” he says, reaching over to flick the blond bangs out of your eyes, “I promise it’s not at all what’s going on in mine.” 

“Bit impromptu - I know you wanted to chill out tonight,” you murmur, ‘nuzzling’ the back of his neck as much as you can with your head three feet from it. 

Jake shakes his own, and you can feel fuzziness that isn’t just his soft hair against the beginning of your neck. Glancing up as much as you your position allows you, you see two black, furry ears blending just about perfectly into the crow black locks. Ah. No wonder he latched onto the bird like its own mother. 

“Not at all! I suppose it is a bit unexpected, but the poor thing obviously needed a good evening of coddling more than me, certainly. Ay?” 

It takes you a moment to realize that mast word was directed, indeed, at the chick rather than you. 

It flops about on the towel where Jake had moved it, and croaks out its response. 

“Capitol,” Jake agrees. 

You watch him bathe the bird some more, dabbing lukewarm water and soap and working out the gunk tacking down the white downy feathers. You allow yourself to bask like a snake under the sun in the quiet, the calm of being home. Amazing what four little walls and kitchen lights and the soft sound of the television playing something mindless in the background can do for a mood. 

A werewolf boyfriend helps too. He runs hotter than humans, then you, and you keep yourself at his back as you let his heat effuse itself into your clammy skin. Nice. Now if only you could convince him to lean down so you could-

“Dirk, why don’t you see if we’ve got anything in the fridge we could make a mash of. He’ll need to eat soon if he’s warming up enough to move around.” 

You raise an eyebrow and notice the baby bird pecking about at the towel and bowl. He’s not old enough to preen, but he snaps at the little feathers Jake had to pull out to clean the worst of the crap off him. If either of you aren’t careful, he might eat it. 

“Sure.” 

Peeling yourself off Jake’s back feels herculean, but you manage to slink off to the refrigerator. Uh..

“..Can it even handle fresh raw stuff?” You ask, noting the couple packets butcher paper wrapped around what is ostensibly supposed to be your boyfriend’s (and you, if you felt like joining him) supper for the next couple days. 

Turns out grocery bills go way down when one of you eats maybe twice a week and only if you’re really digging the flavors. 

“If it’s blended well enough,” Jake shrugs, having honestly cleaned all the stink and grit off the chick, and was just holding it for the pleasure of doing so, you think. “Probably won’t take much as-is. He needs hydration rather than food anyway.” 

“Since when do you know so much about crows anyway,” you comment as you take a spoon to the package of chilling ground meat; a few squirts of warm tap water and the slop you produce is...perfectly appetizing to a baby corvid, you’re sure. 

“Didn’t anyone tell you?” There isn’t a tail physically present, but you don’t let that fool you one bit at the tone in his voice. “The wild is the best teacher!”

“There’s a ‘thrown to the wolves' joke in there somewhere,” you snort. You’d trust him to make it, too. 

He ignores you in favor of putting it back into the towel-nest and rinsing out the bowl he’d used to bathe the chick. You set about scooping the slop into manageable bite sizes for a baby bird. Settling down in the towel, it seems receptive enough. First tentative peck, and then opening wide and gulping down the food and demanding more with croaking caws. 

It’s..quiet for a while. Well, as quiet as it could be with a very demanding little customer at the counter. The sense of peace finally settles though. You allow your eyes to slip closed a bit, allowing your limbs to move on memory. Jake is humming something under his breath, the scent of their home pervasive. Quiet. Nice.

Such an odd thing anyway, the animal wanting anything at all to do with him. Animals didn’t tend to..like you. Dogs barked and cats’ tails bottle-brushed and then fled as your presence grew close. You’d supposed birds the same. 

You’d chalked up the chick’s willingness to be near you then to exhaustion. 

Memories curled through your head like mist on a cold night, much like this one. Your eyes open again, recollections of shadow and something small and warm-blooded and so unknowing what stood before it in all his darkness..

The chick was gurgling to itself, glaring up at you with a beady eye when you put the spoon down and reached out with tentative fingers to brush them over the tiny beak, the soft, clean, snow-white down. Such a rare color in such a creature. You aren’t certain you’ve ever seen a white crow. And it was true albinism too, it seemed, as the chick's eyes dipped open and closed at the brush of cold fingers over down to reveal the tiny rubies.

It’s such a nice time that you forget a baby wild animal is still a wild animal. And a hungry one at that. 

You suppose your good graces with the thing would run short as soon as it had some energy back enough to realize what was so close to, for as fast as anything, as soon as you pull your fingers away enough, there’s a sharp, knife-like little beak digging into the flesh of your hand. 

_"Ow!_ Damn!" you yelp, pulling your hand back and watching yourself clutch at at the wounded finger, black wisps start to rise from the bite, a single drop of tarry red-black on the counter that the little creature zeros in on. You barely manage to get a hand around it (the uninjured one, and making sure to keep clear of that sharp little beak) before it tries anything else. Your grip isn't harsh, but it protests the hold, squirming and trying to go after you again. Jake startles as well and almost drops the bowl, ears pricked and eyes bright. 

“Jake, it’s trying to go Audrey Two on me,” you whine, holding up your injured hand for inspection. It wasn’t deep, even if it hurt like hell. Already you can see the split in the meat of your finger closing, wisps of black stranding out and pulling together, knitting like with like. It barely even bled. 

Your partner takes your hand in his, the underside of his hands rough with dark, calloused skin where the pads of his fingers grip. 

The werewolf examines the injury with you, pressing on the sides of the bite and squeezing a bit to let a droplet of blood form and dribble down your finger. When you curse at him for it, he levels you with a very unimpressed look. 

“Oh, stop that right now - you’re hardly a shying Seymour,” he admonishes warmly. “No one ever warn you about sticking your head in a lion’s mouth, Dirk?” 

“I think not biting the hand that literally feeds you is a better lesson,” you grumble. And you're hardly concerned about leaving your head in places it oughtn’t go - most people couldn’t exist in one piece where your head alone has been. 

The chick is still squirming in your hand and you hold it level to your face, putting on your best intimidating glare, letting your eyes flare a bit. “Under no circumstances!” 

Jake just giggles at the fact you’re quoting campy horrorcomedies to a fucking baby bird. 

Such is your life. No respect from these people. 

You make to set the bird down again in its towel nest and wash off our bloodied finger - already little more than a bruise. There is blood and a bit of that icor of yours still staining the chick’s beak, the odd duality of the light and dark a bit striking as it keeps its little glare going this way and that about the room. Jake takes up the mantle of feeding it where you obviously had failed. Occasionally it will puff up its feathers and wiggle down further. When Jake presses a spoon to its beak and it doesn't open up, you figure it’s time for bedtime. Nesttime? 

Oh, that reminds you.

"Did uh..did Zahhak's call back yet?" You ask at length. 

Jake flicks an ear as he sets aside the dish of slop, finding a lid for it - ugh, you’re probably going to be up and down all night feeding it more. Little menace. 

“No, not this evening. You only got her into the shop yesterday, give the men some space breath, darling. They’ve not wronged you or her yet.” 

You wince a little, but don't let the comment dig. So you’re protective of your Ride, so what? She’s been with you through hell and high waters and every terrain between, and you, her. She deserves the best care in the world. The Zahhaks are the only people you can actually trust with her care aside from yourself. Lately, though, the sort of care she requires is, ah. Out of your wheelhouse. No pun intended...

You keep an eye on the chick as you lean your body on the counter, toying with a lock of your own hair between the fingers of the hand it hadn’t bit. Speaking of care… 

"Jake," you say, watching him set the bowl to the side by the sink, "if he pulls through the night we need to call around to see who can take him." 

You don't recall actually hearing any crows in the neighborhood let alone know where they might nest, but you don't know where the little guy might have come from and he can't be alone yet. You can’t just toss it back out into the cold world without so much as a glance back. 

But.. you can’t keep it. The little bird already doesn’t like you, quite evidently. And Jake would need your help, as enthusiastic as he is, and then you’d have an incredibly intelligent bird that’s imprinted on people on your hands, god only knows what would come of that. And all that aside, 

you don't like the thought of a death even so small on your hands. Even the possibility of one.

Jake bites at his lip, long canine poking out too fucking adorably. 

"We could call Tavros about him? For such a gentle chap, fiercer animals sure love him, and he was a great help with that baby raccoon."

You raise a dubious eyebrow. "I thought you and he had a falling out?" Over said raccoon...or...it's babies? The details are fuzzy to you. 

No pun intended.

That hopeful enthusiasm seems to deflate the werewolf, a frown gracing his face.

"Oh yeah... The raccoon went after his duck. Forgot about that. Er…” Jake looks shiftily to the side. “Maybe his brother Rufioh, then? He’s still in animal husbandry, right..?"

You hear the name and know the reason for Jake’s sudden trepidation in mentioning it. Instantly, your mind flashes to images too fresh of the last time you went to pick up your wheels, the loud banging, the tossed horns and moans as the dwarf mechanic had his way with the minotaur against a client’s hood- 

"Uh. Wouldn’t recall but sure," you concede with a grimace not well hidden. You hadn't stuck around to actually meet the guy Horrus had pulled away from as he’d caught sight of you, stuttering limp excuses and pleas, but those horns like some beast straight outta Texas gave away the familial relation well enough. 

If you could, you’d shake your head. Whatever. Morning stuff to be dealt with then, along with your call to the Zahhak’s shop. You stare off into space (minding the chick in his nest and its relative proximity to your ears and nose lest it get any ideas…) 

The night is still fairly young for the pair of you, ‘you’ being a keyword. There’s your own dinner to fix up (well, Jake’s. You’re not sure you're comfortable intaking much at the moment, the anxiety messing with your sense of homogeneity) and your nightly viewing. On nights like this Jake usually insists, something to settle down to. Watching the slight sway of his hips as he moves around though, you contemplate if he might have wanted a bit more than that tonight. Covered though it was by the clouds, the moon was still sitting fat in her sky, not quite at the peak. It did things to Jake, and all his ilk. 

"Here, hold on a tick,” he says, and disappears into the depths of your home. He returns with an old shoe box. “Somewhere safe for him for the night,” he explains. 

When the chick is good and tucked in and then placed, you turn to Jake, finally able to give the attention your fingertips had been itching for since you’d had to get out of bed that morning. 

You first give him a small smile, picking up your head and letting the black mist between your shoulders hold it in place as you put both hands on his shoulders. You can feel the slight fuzz under his shirt. “Hey,” you murmur, letting your noses almost touch. 

“Hullo. Let’s try this again, shall we?” 

Jake lets a puff of air, smokey grey and lazily drifting between you, pass your lips before he captures them with his own. The black scruff on his cheeks and lip tickles, prompting more aborted laughs out of you. The bastard knows he does this to you, especially when the moon is reaching its zenith. He presses a little harder, his own hands drifting from your waist a bit lower, thumbs dipping just under your sweatpants edge, though no further. An invitation. A tongue prods at your mouth, and you allow it access. 

You can feel the cool black spilling like dry ice every time you open, but Jake has never given indication that he minded, or or said anything if he did. Or that if he presses too hard, you have to move a hand from rubbing over his arms to hold onto your own head to keep it in place. (You think he might like that actually - literally blowing your mind. Hah.) 

He moves from your lips to your neck next, and nips along the seam, your miasma broiling when you lean back against the counter for balance. His chest rumbles in a barely audible growl and you press a hand to it, not pushing away but wanting to feel that thunderous hum. He’s like living steel above you, coiling, his licking and teething getting a bit harder, and as he presses canines that you know are just this side of too long under your jaw you can’t help but let a sound slip out. 

Another sound joins you, and it’s loud and shatters the air like hammer to porcelain. 

Jake jerks at the noise, breaking away to stare at the little chick, staring right back at you over the top of his box. He makes another loud croak, like you and Jake getting your mack on in front of it actually offends it. To your dismay, Jake laughs. 

“Well, perhaps he’s right. The night is still young,” he shrugs. The toothy grin and the firm pat on the rear he leaves you with certainly speak to what may happen if the knight grows old, but the werewolf pulls away from you and beings to go about the business of preparing his own supper. 

True, the moment was broken, and you glance to the little bird, settling down in his nest, blinking slowly and contentedly at the world. You have half a mind to pout at it, but you’re not a child. And responding any more to an animal being coincidentally inconvenient to you would be stupid. 

You let the little creature alone for most of the rest of the evening. Through supper, seeing if it would take some water and more mince sludge before a nightly movie, which it did - you pointedly stuck his bitten hand under his arm when the chick seemed to get a little bored of the mash, letting Jake get on with it. 

During the movie he gets a bit antsy, a bit handsy again. Luckily your little guest has quieted down a fair bit, though you can’t imagine its sleeping. Not with the noises Jake seems to want to prod out of you, as well as the television and lights. The night goes on and you and Jake have your fun but soon break apart to work on whatever. You answer emails and he does the same, fielding questions and needs from co-workers and the higher ups in each of your positions. Twice more Jake checks on the chick, and twice more it refuses water and food. You question that, but Jake doesn’t seem to think it cause for alarm, the chick has eaten and seems alert enough when you open the box to check on it, and sedate when you close the lid, signaling ‘lights out’. 

It’s not until actual bedtime that changes. 

You’re in the bedroom, arranging things just so, tossing some laundry aside and truing setting the bed right (Jake was the last one to leave this morning and he never makes it, leaving it as much of a nest as you’d constructed the chick) and he in the bathroom brushing teeth when the commotion starts. 

The croaking little caws start off small and simple enough that anyone without supernaturally impressive hearing would be able to ignore. It doesn’t stay there though. Within minutes it goes from mildly annoying background noise to ‘holy shit, is someone murdering a baby crow in my house.’ 

Jake of course takes immediate action, toothbrush still in hand and white lather at the edges of his mouth as he trots down the hall to the kitchen. 

You sigh, and finish up, trying not to think of the long night ahead if this is going to keep going as soon as you and Jake leave it alone. Like a puppy, and not when they’re being adorable. You follow him out, head held under your arm and raising an eyebrow. 

Jake’s scooped up the little creature and is shooshing it as it squirms...rather disturbingly in his palm. You scowl in confusion and pad over, watching and trying not to wince as the cries reach a truly piercing level. Jake is trying to speak over the cacophony and keep hold of the thing. 

"Hey, calm down now, it's alright little one, I've got you. Heavens to Betsy, what’s got you all riled up?” 

The chick, of course, doesn’t provide a diagnosis, instead continuing shrieking and thrashing like something possessed. You look up and can see the outright fear in Jake’s eyes, his fuzzy ears high and pinned back. It seems to be on high alert, twitching and eyes rolling about without being able to focus on anything. For a moment, those tiny ruby orbs lock into yours, painfully sharp and glistening. 

The hair at the back of your neck stands up and for a moment you can feel your glamour dropping ever so slightly, eyes flaring and shadows coiling inside under the weight of that little glare. 

It seems to reach a crescendo with that, and like hitting a brick wall, seizes once, and slumps. Limp as a dead thing in Jake’s big hand. 

Jake's eyes go wide and a doglike whine of distress builds in his throat, immediately moving to carefully check its pulse and see if it's breathing. 

"No, nonono, I don't want to have to bury you little guy, you better be okay..." he mutters frantically, stroking at the white feathers. 

The bird is...is breathing, if very softly. It's little heart taps out its rhythm against Jake's fingers. It's alive, but seems very drained.

You reach out a single finger - the same it had seen fit to try and make a meal of earlier - and place it on the little chest. 

_Beat. Beatbeat. Beat._

The shadows move about you, in the periphery of awareness. Like hands they reach, grasp, cannot hold and will not stick, water and oil and just as slick. Jake cannot see them, cannot feel them. He is bottle green and singing, singing in the light. _Moonlight pouring silver and cold and refreshing. No man can. No mortal knows the black that follows you, inside and out. Something Old, something wanting, hungry, in the dark confined and in the dark the beginning and end of all things-_

The room is just a room. You are just two men staring down at a limp crow chick held like the most precious treasure between three hands. 

A sigh works its way from you, and you reach up form the chick to scritch fingers behind the werewolf’s ears. "I think it's ok dude,” you console. “Probably just freaked itself out and it’s not like animals in general love being near me. I think the better question here is...are _you_ alright?"

He sighs in relief, head tipping into the petting and gently running a finger down the bird's back a couple times to settle any ruffled bits of fluff. His eyes gleam with extra moisture though, prompting the question. It takes long moments before you can coax those ears up again. 

"Perfectly alright love. It's just - so *little*, and you know how I worry.” 

You do know how he worries. It worries *you* sometimes, honestly, how much the man..cares. 

Wouldn't have him any other way though. 

"We'll call the shop first thing tomorrow, see if we can get Tav's older bro on the horn and sort this little guy's future situation out." 

The little bird in question twitches and shivers with every couple breaths, then settles down again. He is uncomfortably warm against Jake's fingers. Is he running a fever? Can birds even do that? Jake fusses whenever it moves, though you haven’t the heart to tell him that’s probably a bad idea. 

"Sounds like a plan, dove. I'm sure we can find somewhere safe for him. I think he might be sick, he feels far too warm for such a tiny fellow."

Dirk raises an eyebrow and moves his free hand from the werewolf's ear to the chick's body. He is indeed...uncomfortably warm against your fingers. Is he running a fever? Can birds even do that? The thing is shivering slightly, but appears to be limp as sleep. Its..you furrow your brow, and attempt to jar the chick awake again, poking and prodding. 

No response. That's. Disconcerting. And indeed, the tiny body is quite warm, though, against Dirk's skin even lukewarm water is hot. Still, if Jake's concerned, you figure it to be abnormal. 

It’s actually a bit difficult to get the necessary words out. "We should leave him alone for the night." 

You don't like hearing the whine that gets you, knowing he can't help it, but it's late, and neither of you can really help the beast. Call it a hard truth. 

Jake eventually gives and with a chewed lip, goes to return the little house guest to it’s provided accommodation. "You're probably right,” he mumbles. He puts the bird back in the box, giving it one last stroke to the top of its head as he gets it settled. A glance to the setup to make sure there's no problems, and then he's turning towards you. 

"Ready for bed?"

You hold your head up, and peck a kiss on his lips. "As long as you are."

As he’s walking away to the bedroom, you cast a glance back at the bird before following. It's sleeping still, quiet but alive.

Maybe this will be alright in the morning.

**Author's Note:**

> Hi. :>
> 
> Back at it again with another new fic. Some warnings for this chapter include animal distress, minor medical procedures and some minor wounds. 
> 
> We're very excited. :D


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